When Little King
Story was originally released on the Wii, it was one of those
sleeper hits that successfully combined a variety of gaming
genres together to provide this engaging experience. Given that,
Little King Story is one of my favourite top ten games on the
Nintendo Wii and I was thoroughly excited when I heard that the
Vita would receive the sequel.

Although a
little apprehensive at first on how the sequel would pan out on
the PS Vita, the innovative controls of this console definitely
enhanced the original gaming experience and 30 hours later, I'm
still enjoying this title and finding new things littered
through the gaming world. It's just down right fun and quite
playable!

The story of
"New Little King Story" continues from the previous installment
that has seen the kingdom you built in the previous game overrun
by your evil nemesis the Devil King and his creatures.
Fortunately King Corobo still has his trusted advisors who will
assist you in not only winning back your lost Kingdom but
building a new Kingdom. You also have your Royal Guards who will
generally do the nasty killing for you and get their hands
dirty. Best of all, previous knowledge of the original story is
not a mandate as the game welcomes newcomers to the franchise
quite well.

The first part of the game serves as a tutorial to teach you the
game mechanics and the controls of the PS Vita. In essence, you
need to build a new kingdom and visit other parts of the world
in order to liberate your citizens and more importantly, rescue
the royal princesses who have been imprisoned.

At its fun
gaming heart, New Little King Story is a combination of RTS
meets RPG as you complete quests, build new structures and of
course complete a variety of missions as you search for the
missing princesses. New classes, items and building are
available as you progress through the game which is generally
opened up to the player once they have defeated a boss of one of
the 7 locations that you must liberate.

Your townsfolk
can also be used to perform certain tasks such as turning them
into soldiers for killing or woodcutters to gather wood which is
a precious resource. It's actually quite an engaging game on the
PS Vita and dare I say as enjoyable as the Wii version but maybe
more so due to the fact that the game is portable. Controlling
your citizens or more specifically your royal guard is extremely
reminiscent of Pikmin as you send your followers in a particular
direction to complete a task such as moving a huge rock in your
path or attacking enemies.

Enemies range
from grunts to massive boss battles which is quite fun as you
send your royal guards into battle. There is an element of
online for New Little King Story that include downloadable
content, item combining co-operative play and even leader
boards. For me however, the single-player game is where this
title shines. As mentioned the gameplay is just fun and I love
exploring this world and sending my Pikmin like creatures to do
work.

Graphics/Audio

Graphically, New
Little King Story is pure eye candy on the PS Vita with some fun
anime looking characters and environments. As the hours in the
day progress so does the lighting which looks rather impressive.
Backgrounds, albeit a little simplistic suit the cartoon
atmosphere of the game and the pseudo 3D environments help
immerse the player into this world.

Sound effects
and music work well with the gameplay and more importantly, the
controls are quite flawless on the PS Vita. I especially love
the inclusion of the touch screen into this franchise which
makes it more receptive to the player. The only downside to the
graphics is that some of the text is a little small to read
which may effect some older gamers and that lag is an issue when
you have more than 15 followers.

Final Level

Some critics
have been too harsh with New Little King Story on the PS Vita
and as my King would say... off with their heads. No, New Little
King Story is probably once again misunderstood by these critics
but if you want a title that successfully combines elements of
RTS and RPG with a colourful story and some great
characterisation than New Little King Story is for. Controls are
quite responsive, graphics are cute and all in all, New Little
King Story is probably the most fun I've had on the VITA in
months! Recommended!